Here rests the beauty
by Gingerninjaunicorn
Summary: Full Title: 'here rests the beauty, the pain and the lies, for come tomorrow we say our goodbyes. Ianto Jones is seventeen when he first meets Scathach, and she saved his life. It sort of became a habit. Somehow a fix-it for Exit Wounds and CoE


**Notes: Google Scathach before you read this, or it will make ****_very _****little sense, although I did make the immortality bit up. **

**I don't own the rights to Torchwood or ancient Irish mythology. Duh. **

The first time Ianto Jones meets her he is…indisposed.  
Ianto has been on the streets since he was fifteen, and in those two years he still hasn't managed to keep his temper in check.  
Sometimes it just earns him a sneer, more often a knock to the face, but this time it's earned him a knife to the gut. As darkness swarms his vision, he sees a blur of red hair and an angry snarl, and when he wakes he's in a freaking dojo with a kindly looking young woman bending over him. He tries to sit, to run, to panic, because Ianto Jones is a street kid and it's in his instincts. But she pushes him back down, gently but firmly (and damn, she's strong) and says something soothing in what sounds like old Gaelic spoken in a Scottish accent and for some reason that makes him laugh.  
"Hush," she says, in English. See seems motherly, despite the fact she's no older than twenty, so he lies back. "I've got you, you're ok. My name is Sca, and you are lucky to be alive."  
Ianto tries to speak, but darkness claims him once more.

X

When he wakes, he is lying in a dojo alone.  
He can vaguely remember a knife fight, a burning pain, and a red haired woman and muttered Gaelic.  
He is barefoot, naked from the waist up, wearing clean black trousers that are soft and warm and most definitely don't belong to him. When he runs a hand down his abdomen and looks down he finds a faint pink scar below his ribs, the only evidence of the fight. But it's healed, and Ianto stomach sinks. He's been out for weeks, he thinks. In some strange Scottish woman's dojo.  
Speaking of which, the walls of the dojo are high and have various swords hanging on them. They could be for decoration, but there is a dark gleam on one of the blades that looks suspiciously like blood.  
Ianto swallows.  
The dojo is smaller than he'd have expected, but rather large nonetheless, and he jumps when a small hand comes to rest on his shoulder.  
The young woman stands behind him, concern etched into her pretty face.  
Wild red hair is tied loosely in a ponytail over her left shoulder. Her skin is pale, freckled. Irish skin, almost, or maybe Scottish. She is shorter than Ianto (almost everyone is, but she barely clears his shoulder) but she holds herself like a fighter.  
Previously he'd thought her young, but on closer expectation she is ageless. Her eyes are old, and she could be anywhere between twenty and forty.  
"How are you feeling?" she asks.  
"Alright, I guess," Ianto replies. "How long was I unconscious?"  
"Two days," she replies. "And I must say, you heal amazingly quickly."  
Ianto looks down at the pink scar, that had to be weeks old, and finds it looking older than it had minutes ago; white, nearly silver, fading into his skin.  
Sca, as she had called herself, is holding a mug of tea, and she presses it into his hands with a gentle smile.  
"You have been injured," she says. "You must rest. And then you must learn to fight properly; your form is horrible. But rest first."  
And Ianto does what she says because he's clean and warm and safe (unless she's poisoned the tea, but he doesn't think so) and he feels better than he has for a long time.  
When he wakes from his slumber she is doing Tai-chi exercises with a long curved sword, and she asks him to stay.

X

Ianto stays with Sca for five months.  
She offers him space to live in the dojo (Sca doesn't live here, or at least she doesn't sleep here (if she sleeps at all, she doesn't seem to)) and she feeds him.  
The dojo isn't far from where Ianto was stabbed, on the edges of Chinatown, and he barely leaves the dojo in those weeks, and only to go to the thriving Chinatown and not beyond.  
London has always scared the fuck out of Ianto, and his little pocket of safety isn't something he is about to let go.  
And Sca teaches him.  
She teaches him every type of martial arts he's heard of and one or two he hasn't, she teaches him to sneak around unseen, she teaches him sword fighting and knife fighting and more types of self-defence that should be legal. She teaches him to catalogue his mind, she teaches him meditation. She teaches him how to stay calm no matter what, and she teaches him to school his mind into a calm mask and not let any emotions out.  
Sca is kind, and deadly. She has an odd sort of sense of humour; the type that when she tells a joke you don't realise it is a joke until ten minutes later and she has left the room.  
Sca is bloody mysterious, and too old for her face. She holds herself like a warrior, and one day Ianto comes across shining armour in her trunk by accident.  
For five months everything is good and happy and calm.  
They are almost domestic, Ianto and Sca. It is odd; the teenage boy used to a rough life on the streets and the Scottish martial arts master, who seems alone in the world. It is odd and comforting and dysfunctional.  
Until she comes home from one of her late night wanders covered in blood and frantic. She is throwing weapons about, tossing them to him, getting an array of her own and yelling at them that they need to go, to run, and then the sound of drums reaches his ears.  
She presses a last long knife into his hands and tells him to run.  
She kisses him on the lips, ever so lightly, and pushes him out the back door.  
She screams at him to run, and he does.  
But when he goes back to the dojo three hours later, it is empty but covered in blood. Sick to the stomach, Ianto runs.  
He goes to the coppers first. He doesn't know why, because when have coppers ever been useful to Ianto (answer: never) and when they arrive, grim and solemn, the dojo has completely vanished. Poof. Like it was never there. The cops shake their heads at him and rack off, and Ianto is left alone and wondering.

X

He takes up as a thief.  
Sca's training has been good for him like that. He's silent and deadly, just like a six-foot, knife-wielding shadow, and soon he's got his own flat (very basic, but it's still a warm place to sleep with running hot water every night) and a part-time job (his other line of work pays better, but the landlord was getting suspicious).  
Sometimes he goes back to the edges of Chinatown, but Sca's dojo is gone, vanished, and he fools himself into thinking she never really existed when she shows up on his door.  
It had been nearly two years since they last met. Ianto is now going on nineteen, but Sca looks the same as ever, right down to every freckle and every wild red hair.  
She smiles at him and he invites her in for tea.  
Sca sits on his rickety barstool and looks so out of place it's nearly funny.  
"Who are you really?" Ianto asks. "I mean, I never even got your last name, and Sca's short for something, isn't it?"  
"I am called Scathach," said Sca, in the odd tone of voice she sometimes used. It sounded nearly as if she as from another time.  
"Like the ancient warrior woman," Ianto said with a faint smile, which faded as his stomach twisted. She seemed ageless…a martial arts expert… red hair…Scottish…the swords…  
"Oh, you're shitting me," Ianto said aloud. Sca smiled, her bright smile, and twisted a lock of hair between her fingers.  
"So I'm having tea with a several hundred year old myth?"  
"I am no myth, Ianto Jones," she smirked. "I am _very _real, thanks."  
"Are you immortal?" asks Ianto, which is a stupid question, but she shakes her head.  
"I will die, one day," she said. "It shall just take a little longer than most humans."  
"But why me? Why did you save me? All those things you taught me – why?"  
"I had a pupil, once," Sca said fondly. "Cu Chulainn. You remind me of him; brave, willing to learn, and just a tad foolish. When I saw you – something about the way you fearlessly stood up to armed thugs reminded me of him. So I saved you. I healed you, and gave you a home. But old enemies were coming for me, and I could not allow you to get caught up in a fight that's not your own. But they are defeated now, and you are safe."  
Ianto nodded dumbly, watching her as she reached across to hold his hand.  
"I have been so alone for so long, Ianto. I need you more than you could ever know. But I have a journey a head of me, a long one. I must leave you, I am sorry, and I may never return. But know that the things are taught you are more valuable than you'll ever know, and do not forget them."  
Ianto nodded again, her words settling on his shoulders like a heavy physical weight.  
"And Ianto?" he leaned forward and she whispered in his ear, "Don't forget to eat plenty of vegetables."  
And she was gone, with a flash of red and laughter.

X

Torchwood caught him breaking into a house full of alien tech. Ironically, he was only there for the diamonds. They hired him. He met a pretty girl called Lisa. The rest, they say, is history.

X

Jack is struggling with a weevil. It's a big, savage brute and it's killed twice.  
Ianto comes out of nowhere, when Jack is down, and not for the first time Jack wonders where on this planet Ianto learnt to fight, because the brute is down and out in seconds.  
Its buddy, who's even bigger and even more of a brute, latches onto Ianto from behind.  
Jack's heart stopped, because this couldn't be happening, not to his Ianto.  
Not after Jack left, the Master, the John Hart fiasco and the sleeper incident. Not this. He couldn't lose Ianto now.  
She comes out of nowhere; a red haired blur wielding a curved sword and in two seconds and a neat arch the weevil's head is rolling and Ianto is free, fine, ok, alive, and Jack nearly cries with relief.  
He hugs Ianto; once tightly, sobbing as he did so, and turns to face the newcomer as he breaks free. She's watching with a content sort of smile on her face, and when Jack turns to her she sheaths the bloody sword and bows.  
"Captain," she says, "I am in your service."  
Jack is contemplating what to make of this when Ianto pushed past him and envelopes her in a bear hug. She laughs and twists away, gasping that _It's good to see you too but I've got to breath, Ianto Jones! _  
Ianto turns to Jack and says with a perfectly straight face, "Jack, this is Scathach, but she prefers Sca. She is eighteen hundred years old and it's a really bad idea to get on her bad side. Sca, this is Jack Harkness, and it's his fault I am now a theatrical bastard."  
She grins, kisses Ianto on the cheek, and nods to Jack, and then scales the brick wall beside them and is gone.  
"Sorry, Jack, but we've got catching up to do," Ianto says, and follows her.  
Jack is confused, and jealous.

X

Ianto is brighter and happier than anyone has ever seen him before, and one by one they find out why.  
Jack did on the morning after the double weevil/ancient Scottish warrior fiasco.  
"She's an old friend," Ianto replied when Jack asked about Scathach. "She saved my life once, and then it sort of became a habit."  
Owen finds out when he's out on the pull (he's depressed because Tosh had a thing with Tommy and he's sort of in love with Tosh) and he sees the tea boy and a gorgeous red head stumble out a club, drunk. They are laughing, hands entwined, and Ianto has never looked happier (or younger, and Owen teases him about that later and asks how the bloody hell he even got into a club).  
Tosh finds out of Ianto, because he wants her to meet Scathach because she's 'bloody brilliant, Tosh, really' 'Great pair of tits.' 'Fuck off, Owen.'.  
Gwen finds out after she sees a picture of her at Ianto's desk.  
Jack is jealous.  
Ianto likes jealous Jack. Even though he can't walk properly for days afterward.

X

The team meet Scathach when Aaron Copley is seconds away from shooting Owen and she knocks the old man out from behind.  
Only she, Ianto and Jack realise just how close to death Owen had come to death, and after that Jack is much keener to have her around.  
But he does want to know why she was there in the first place.  
"I had a bad feeling," she replied. "Eighteen hundred years gives you a knack for sensing trouble."  
She's one of the team after that.

X

There are two buildings with bombs in them and Scathach comes close to death once more.  
A hologram of a man in a red jacket and a boy with large ears called 'Grey'.  
She's got a really bad feeling.

X

Grey is in front of Tosh, poised to shoot, and suddenly his head separates from his neck and rolls away.  
Scathach stands, sword bloody, and Tosh gets Owen out of the nuclear plant with seconds to spare.  
But no one dies.  
(Except for Grey, and John Hart nearly loses a carelessly placed hand. Scathach doesn't like it when she's felt up by morons from space.)

X

"Do you love Jack, Ianto?"  
Ianto swallows, hard.  
"Yes, I think so. Why?"  
"I'm old, Ianto. Old and tired. And I can give you my life. It won't be forever, but it shall be close."  
"Sca –"  
"I want to die, Ianto, and I can think of no better way (aside from in battle) than giving you hundreds, thousands of years with the man you love."  
Ianto swallows hard, and says, "But I don't want you to go."  
She smiles, and pulls the empty locket from around her neck. It is not an elegant locket, and has always been empty. She cuts a lock of curly red hair off and places it in the locket, and places the locket in Ianto's hands.  
And then she kisses him. Long and deep, giving the gift of long life and youth to Ianto, and when she pulls back she smiles, and goes limp in his arms.  
He closes her eyes as tears fall from his, the ancient warrior, _his _ancient warrior, dead in his arms.

X

Scathach is buried in a wild place, a cliff overlooking the sea in a forest.  
She would have loved it.  
Ianto wears her sword at his belt now, and Jack's hand seems to be superglued to his.  
Owen wanders into the hub one day and hands Tosh a promise ring.  
They close the rift.  
Aliens learn not to fuck with planet Earth.  
Life is calm. Good.  
"Jack, we've got a spaceship hovering over Newport."  
Sort of.  
Ianto teaches David and Mica self-defence.  
People in the street look at Ianto funny because he wears a girl's locket, and Ianto doesn't care.

X

"Hey, Ianto, how long have we been together?"  
"I don't know, Jack, I had too many hypervodka's last night."  
"Oh, yeah, this planet has awesome alcohol. Better than Earth, definitely. About four hundred years, you reckon?"  
"Us? About that, yeah, why?"  
"Let's get hitched."  
"Are you drunk?"  
"Hung over. But serious, Ianto, let's get married."  
"That's the least romantic proposal I've ever heard."  
"That a yes?"  
"Of course."  
"I love you."  
"I love you too, idiot."

X

Finis.

**…um, ok, that was completely random. And it sort of made itself into a fix-it. And I'm ok with that.  
but seriously, my midnight ramblings are getting weirder…and weirder…and weirder. **


End file.
